Should Weaponmaster's be Nerfed?

[Adam Antium]

Again, those numbers were off the top of my head, they can be altered or something different could be done. I find that a WM being more consistent and less bursty and susceptible to common monster types (or palemasters being immortal) wouldn't be a bad thing.

I don't find WM's to be absurdly strong, they're pretty average actually, sort of by design as has been brought up. But that doesn't mean potential changes aren't interesting to discuss, reducing the "I did 300 damage in one swing and 40 damage in 4 more swings" to "I do 80 damage every swing and have higher AB" or something might be interesting.

But I don't have a dog in this race. Maybe WM's don't want to lose the burstiness of their class.

[Shadowy Reality]

Nobody in this topic has really explained why WM is overtuned, or even how. Just that "it is".

WMs have high AB, but nothing astronomical compared to other builds, and they are solid in all other departments, be it AC, saves, HP. It is that burstiness that makes them feel so overtuned. Arelith pvp leans very heavily that way. The ability to suddenly do 240 damage in the first attack flurry is extremely strong and quite a step up from 160 which is what a non-WM would do.

WMs are incidentally quite easy to play, you just have to click things (this is obviously an oversimplification, there is the whole UMD dance and counter-dance). Besides any buffs you may need, usually haste and improved invis are enough, you are ready to do, you have no other activations.

WM also punishes much more heavily all builds that cannot reach certain AC thresholds. WM also punishes much more heavily anyone that is not at the top of their game, or that did not have time to prepare.

This is all to say, WM is probably the class that excels in the most scenarios, with the least skill or effort involved. They are just meh when everyone is fully buffed and has competitive builds (which is not the majority of Arelith pvp), in all other scenarios, they nothing short of monsters.

[Archnon]

Honestly, I was more interested in the responses of strong players when I started this thread than the actual Nerf. I think it is interesting that things can become so ingrained in a community that they are taken for granted. As I read this, I think that some of that is the case here. Weaponsmaster, much like the bard dip, has become so core that people just think it is fine as it is, and necessary to boot. It is part of all melee build calculations. Two things stand out.

First, WM is the standard optimal build for melee fighters, and everyone thinks that is as it should be. For Example:

Weaponmaster is a dominant build that is often used as the benchmark when balancing new content.

WM is used as the gold standard for a "good" build that can both pvp and pve and is fairly accessible to newer players.

If weapon masters can't hurt something because it's just too tough, that often implies it's too tough for ANYBODY ELSE to hurt, too. WM's don't have the highest AB, but they have high AB, and they have very good damage. If a class is simply immune to the power of MUSCLE, then that presents an issue: are they only touchable by one or two builds, and running roughshod over everything else? That's not an optimal balancing situation.

So, in a lot of ways, WM's can be a useful metric to help diagnose balance issues with other classes.

Secondly, WM are overpowered at exactly the right time. Sure I agree with our benevolent leader when he said:

Personally I've never found Weapon Masters appealing, because they're so situational. It's all about those criticals, yet we have entire dungeons where that's useless.

Sure I get they have some real PvP strength, but I think we too often judge build strength through that lens.

But the reality is, as Peppermint noted, people are going to pick their dungeons, and there are plenty of dungeons to grind that don’t have crit immunity. Frankly, Rogues and SD’s have the same problem.
What players don’t always have is the autonomy to pick is their PVP opportunities. Not every player is going to send a tell and be like, he, I am open to PVP if you are and it makes a good story. Sometimes you just get into it and don’t have a choice. And frankly, As Shadowy Reality said, this is why they are overtuned. To Quote everyone :

In short, weaponmasters are pretty average right now but they have two things going for them: 1. short prep time 2. with a support they really pop off. You could nerf them but then you'd kill off the few of us who still play the class, and they are certainly nowhere as problematic as bards, paladins, druids, and monks until very recently.

Someone is talking threateningly to you? Walk up to them and then type something in response. If pvp happens you just immediately blast them with the power of MUSCLE before they have time to buff or anything.

I would not say WMs is exactly straight overpowered. It is just a very simple power boost. You will notice that whenever something new comes out that is remotely melee inclined one of the first things people will think is: "Can I fit WM7 in here?". Look at the Barbarian/WM Kensais, look at the recent katana Monk/WM.

WM is very binary, it either works too well, or not very well. In PvP, against people that don't know what they are doing or have less PvP optimal builds they will make short work of them. Against people that really know what they are doing and have decent builds, they are meh. To be honest, even against seaspned PvPers WM still has a very good chance to win, due to the amount of damage they can dish out, all it takes is a mistake (being caught flat-footed for instance), to go from >50% HP to dead.

Nobody in this topic has really explained why WM is overtuned, or even how. Just that "it is". I personally am not convinced that they're anything other than average, with an advantage in situations of a) under-prep, b) "shotgun" scenarios, where a fight starts fast and suddenly or c) deer-in-headlights situations.

This is all to say, WM is probably the class that excels in the most scenarios, with the least skill or effort involved. They are just meh when everyone is fully buffed and has competitive builds (which is not the majority of Arelith pvp), in all other scenarios, they nothing short of monsters.

Ultimate, what I read from all of this is that they are dominant at exactly the point that it matters: When the chips hit the fan and everyone is out swinging. Ultimately, every build is gonna be good when you give it the wind up time. This is what matters for most dungeons, Stack on your buffs, stroll through and hope nothing dispels you to death. But the reality of WM is that if PVP starts, they are going to flatten and crit the average toon to death before the person finishes their windup. Walking into PVP full wound up is rare, and often a sign that RP was set aside for a blatant attack.

As an aside, if there is ever an updated release of the class selection data post recent nerfs, I would love to get it as a .csv or excel file to analyze it, because my gut instinct tells me if you actually dug into that data, you would see where your dominant classes are.

However, the reality seems to me that the server is okay with this type of dominance because it serves a balancing purpose and as Tarkus put it:

You could nerf them but then you'd kill off the few of us who still play the class.

[Sea Shanties]

Rogues are definitely pointless against undead (as soon as the holy grenades run out at least) and other sneak attack immune things. I think the case for WM being useless against the same is being overstated. They won't get their spectacular crits but if they are strength based and have their weapon properly tricked out they'll still do enough damage to matter.. It will just be slower and more boring than they are used to.

Also not really sure what to make of the PVP argument. They do high burst damage, yes, but isn't that realistic? Someone who's physically weak isn't going to win if they get in a face-to-face fight with a green beret, it's going to be one punch and they're down. You run away or talk your way out of it then strike when you have the advantage and big weapons on your side. Since RP has to happen before PVP anyone who knows what they are doing can handle a fight with one assuming levels and equipment are roughly equal but it involves swallowing your pride (in game and OOC) and fighting dirty or smart, not with honor, even if that just means getting halfway across the room. If you lose a fight because you let the WM have an initial burst it usually means you're too stubborn to back away from a fight that was clearly going to happen. Likewise a WM who loses the opportunity to burst is going to be in a sorry spot if they hand over advantage... That all just seems appropriate, this isn't a game where everyone is supposed to be equally matched in all scenarios.

I think this thread is fishing for problems that aren't really there or at least aren't pressing enough to re-work and potentially break one of the most played classes on the server. Opening up more weapons as viable would be wonderful of course, changing how damage is delivered entirely for the sake of change-- i dunno about that.

[Archnon]

I think this thread is fishing for problems that aren't really there or at least aren't pressing enough to re-work and potentially break one of the most played classes on the server.

I think this was exactly my point and I couldn't have said it better. What you miss is that just because it is one of the most played classes doesn't mean it should be immune to examination. On the contrary, it should invite questions!

[Ork]

What you miss is that just because it is one of the most played classes doesn't mean it should be immune to examination. On the contrary, it should invite questions!

Why? It is a weird platitude to say that WM is dominant when it needs to be. It isn't. It is the staple build because it is easy and does what it is suppose to do well. That's not a reason for examination. I'd argue it's the reason it's the standard of balance in our community. Metric has their one True Kilogram, Arelith has the weaponmaster.

Shake it up to be quirky or what have you, but just because something isn't examined doesn't mean it should be.

[Sea Shanties]

I think this thread is fishing for problems that aren't really there or at least aren't pressing enough to re-work and potentially break one of the most played classes on the server.

I think this was exactly my point and I couldn't have said it better. What you miss is that just because it is one of the most played classes doesn't mean it should be immune to examination. On the contrary, it should invite questions!

I got your point but this is one of those cases where two people can say the exact same thing and still disagree. No big deal, just different opinions.

[Peppermint]

As a player that actually has a PvP background (i.e. I spent multiple years exclusively on PvP servers before coming here), I'm kind of puzzled by the premise. While solid in some metas and on some servers, Weapon Masters aren't considered universally strong in any serious builders community.

Lots of classes are compared to the Weapon Master here because it's well-rounded. It's a good measuring stick. That's all.

The class is ubiquitous because it's simple and effective. We tend to recommend it to new players in Arelith's Discord for the same reason. That doesn't mean it's the best or overpowered; that simply means it's very newbie friendly. It's dominant in simplicity, not strength.

Weapon Masters suffer from lackluster AC (~50ish) and saving throws. Though they do solid damage, they don't even do the best damage. Buffed Bardadins, Paladins, and Divine Champions all pose greater threats to most builds, owing to higher base damage and more AB. And if shotgun threats are the concern, then I'd point to Assassins, Rogues, and Rangers, the latter having just as much finishing power as a Weapon Master. Yet none of these are guaranteed to kill at the click of a button. ~500 hit points plus a 300 hit point -pray make most characters far too tanky to cut through in a single round.

Truthfully, Weapon Master isn't even close to top tier. That honor goes to Bards, Paladins, and Harpers. These classes aren't as popular, because none of them are as straightforward or have the same universal appeal. However, they are better.

There are a lot of factors that go into a class' popularity; judging a class' strength purely by its ubiquity is rather myopic at best. And while it's all well and good to contend that one class "does too much damage", no one's likely to take that argument seriously without meaningful figures to support it.

[Tarkus the dog]

After playing roughly 6 WM, 4 of which I got to high epic:

If I was asked what class I want to be in a PvP in order to beat the other guy, I'd say paladin or a mage.

If I was asked what class I want to be in a PvP in order to have fun, I'd say WM.

Like I said, a single issue exists with WMs is that they can really catch people off guard, and in a roleplaying server where a settlement leader can one-line an entire other faction this can quickly become a problem. WMs can really burst people down.

But so can mages, warlocks, barbarians, rogues/assassins, rangers, etc.

On top of that, there's ten other things that need adjusting right now. WMs, who is sort of a "nice, our PvE experience will be fast" is probably more than fine right now.

As for the dungeons, most of the dungeons I visit are undead ones. Oh and on the last note, scimitars and rapiers are certainly the strongest in PvE, but in PvP and against high AC targets the guy who picked bastard sword is a baller. There is some variety, but I think it's mostly based around the races.

[malcolm_mountainslayer]

What if we changed weapon masters to give increased damage and AB instead of increased critical multiplier and range? The damage would be based on the weapon's critical multiplier, the AB would be in place of crit range increase and be based on the weapon's base critical hit range.

Say, 1d6+1 extra damage for each crit multiplier (greataxe gets 3d6+3, greatsword gets 2d6+2, etc.), and instead of a +2 to the crit range of a weapon, you get +1 AB equal to the range of the weapon's base critical range (greataxe gets +1, rapier gets +3, etc.).

The tradeoff of crit range/crit multiplier on weapon choices, and the weapon master still being great at melee, are preserved, but the insane burst damage and awful performance against undead/constructs is all lessened. These ideas are off the top of my head, but something similar might be interesting to discuss.

And ban scythe because it's a fecking stupid weapon anyway and everybody who wields one and DOESN'T play a convincing farmer should get 0 RPR. Wait, did I say that out loud? Oops.

You know war scythes are a thing? Myrkul was also never a farmer, it is a fantasy setting.



The "certain weapons" viable isn't soley a WM problem. Its in snd 3.x/pathfinder. Like longswords just straight up suck. An average damage of plus 1 for less crit range? (You can even two hand Scimitar in it for diversity) burn a whole feat to increase your average damage by two with a bastard sword vs a scimitar but still significantly weaker crit rsnge? Not worth it.

It's a system where most you damage doesnt come from the weapons bur the modifers addeed.

I feel like the best thing we could do is revamp the weapon die system with haks.

Like if a bastard sword did 3 to 10 damage.

Essentislly make the less crazy crit weapons (x4s and 18-20s are crit crazies) have more reliable damage by increasing their min damage to slightly boost their average damage.